


Shoulder to Cry On

by triggerswaggiehavoc



Category: Dangan Ronpa, Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-06
Updated: 2015-03-06
Packaged: 2018-03-16 14:55:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3492569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/triggerswaggiehavoc/pseuds/triggerswaggiehavoc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even after escaping the academy, Naegi is still plagued by nightmares of his friends' deaths; fortunately,  Togami is around to comfort him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shoulder to Cry On

It's happening again.

Kuwata sits strapped to his post, terror in his eyes, waiting. That sinister chuckle. They're coming. The baseballs fly into him over and over. They won't stop coming. His skull is crushed, blood is coming out of his eyes, they're still coming. His brain is liquid, they keep coming, his bones are pudding, they keep coming, he's only a pulp, they keep coming, coming, coming. I can't watch. I turn my face but she grabs me, she turns me back, her nails digging in, her perfumed breath stinging my eyes. "Watch, Naegi-kun! Watch!"

I snap my eyes open and I hear myself screaming before I feel my throat going raw. I clutch desperately at my own neck but the noise won't stop. I'm losing control over my own body. I feel my lungs start to give out and suddenly there's a firmness on my arms, my face. My eyes are wide open; I can't see a thing.

"Naegi... Naegi!" Very far away. My imagination. "Naegi!" Closer now. Maybe it's real? "NAEGI!"

Suddenly Togami enters my vision. I can see again. I stop screaming, finally able to breathe. His knuckles are going white around my arms and his eyes are too wide. I can't look at them so I don't look at anything.

I don't know how many times I've seen his eyes like that these past few weeks. Every time I wake up, it seems, I'm staring into those crystal  blues and trying to stop screaming. I have bruises on my arms where he grips me. Every time, every time.

He is far different now than he was back then. Back then, he was too far elevated for any of us to touch. Back then, he was cold and unfeeling. Back then, he never would have held me until I could forget the nightmare I once lived. He is much softer now; his smooth, sharp edges have been rounded and worn by the passage of time. I suspect some of that weathering might be my doing.

The first time I had a dream like this, it was Maizono's lifeless body that I saw. When I shot awake in a cold sweat, I did not scream. I cried. I cried until my throat was aching, until I could no longer control the convulsions of my body for my shuddering sobs, until my own tears so blinded me that I could not see my own hand clutching the pillow before my face. Togami was there that time. He watched me. I don't think consolation was a skill he then possessed. But that was not my last dream, and he changed quickly.

Hot tears are still squeezing past my eyelashes and onto his shoulder. His arms are around me, but I can still feel where his hands once were. It's hard to breathe with my face full of his shirt like this, but I'd rather suffocate in his arms than gulp in air all alone.

I remember what happened after my third dream. It was Oowada that time. Around and around and around forever with Ishimaru's wails as cacophonous background music. After that dream, Togami tried to comfort me for the first time. He opened his arms wordlessly and just stared at me as I wept. I just stared back through my tears, confusion only adding to my distress. After several minutes, I was able to gurgle out a few hoarse words. "What... are you doing?" He sighed with irritation.

"My shoulder, you fool," he said. "I'm offering it to you. You may cry on it if you wish."

His shoulder was hard and bony, but somehow it helped. As I think back on it now, his shoulder has gotten so much softer. I breathe in his scent and he smells clean and safe and alive. The last of my tears drip down and I bring my arms around to hold onto him tightly. He is alive. He is with me. He is not going anywhere.

I have no idea how long we lie like this. He strokes my hair. I always feel like a child after I have these dreams, needing to be consoled, coddled, pacified back into normalcy. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. I want to be able to sleep peacefully and wake up smiling and tell Togami good morning without having to soak his shirt with my tears and set his ears ringing with my shrieks. I know it must be terrible for him. I know he must hate having to take care of me like he does, but he never says a word about it.

"I'm sorry," I say now that my violent sobbing has ceased.

"Sorry for what?" he says quietly, still stroking my hair.

"For... this," I say, pushing myself up a little to look at his face. Aside from his eyes being opened slightly wider than normal, he shows no expression. My face is still wet as I continue. "For you having to baby me because I keep having these nightmares and I can't hold myself together." I almost start crying again. "Because I can't do anything for myself and you have to help me with everything."

"Naegi..." The corners of his mouth turn down into a pretty frown as he speaks.

"I know it's a chore for you, and--"

"Naegi." I am caught off guard by the severity in his tone. I look into his piercing eyes and suddenly he is a stern teacher and I am a student caught cheating on an exam. This sharpness in his eyes has been so absent of late that I'd forgotten it, but seeing it again now, I am terrified to say a word. "Don't you dare insinuate anything of this sort ever again. If I did not want to help you... if I did not want you to feel better... I would not be doing these things. Do you understand?"

I am too stunned to answer. I start to stammer out a reply, but his finger comes to my lips and his gaze softens.

"I am here for you." I feel my heart squeeze tightly in my chest. It feels like he isn't looking at me but instead right through me, right down to my core, to that shivering child who just wants to go home. The toddler crying for mommy. The mommy that isn't coming. Togami is kissing away the fresh tears on my face before I even know I'm crying them.

"T... Togami?" I manage, bewildered. His lips are softer than I expected and smooth against my cheek. "What are you..."

"Shh." His minty breath tickles my skin. It feels nice, and I am momentarily distracted, but then I remember that Togami is kissing me and I snap back to reality.

"Why are you..." I begin, but he hushes me again, with his mouth this time, and when I'm again able to speak, I'm too flustered to do it.

"Because I want to," he says, eyes shooting through me again, but this time all they see is a warm puddle. "It's fine, isn't it?" I'm too dumbfounded to answer him. "You've got your mind on me now, don't you?"

It's now that I realize. He's helping me again. He's trying to pull me up from the past I can't stop drowning in by making me forget that I don't know how to swim. Once again, Togami is fixing me up. I put my hand up to his face to stop him. "You don't need to do this." The shake in my voice is audible.

"Naegi," he sighs, dropping his forehead to rest against mine. "Please. Just let me."

"Why do you want to?" My heart tightens at the sound of his words.

"Don't try to deal with everything on your own." His eyes are closed. His long eyelashes are mesmerizing. "I love you too much to let you do this to yourself." My eyes widen.

"Could you... say that again?"

"No," he snaps immediately, a smirk stretching his lips. Part of the Togami I knew back at the academy is still inside of him after all. He presses another kiss to my lips and repeats his question from earlier. "You've got your mind on me now, don't you?" It's more playful this time. I see his eyes twinkling.

"Always."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading thr gay


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